Students reflect on LGBTQA acceptance across colleges nationwide

Colleges nationwide are taking strides to become more accepting of students’ sexualities and gender identities. However, some are making more progress than others.

As the country becomes more progressive, some students find it easier to come out. However, while students may be “out,” colleges don’t collect these statistics, said Shane Windmeyer, founder and executive director of Campus Pride, a national organization that works to create LGBT-friendly campuses.

Apart from the lack of knowledge Windmeyer said fewer than 12% of colleges have LGBT student centers. In 2013, less than 67% of colleges have Gay Straight Alliances or LGBT clubs, he said.

“It was confusing at first, but everyone called me Parker, without hesitation,” Malone says. “It was hard because I really identify with Paige, but there was too much assumption with it, it’s very feminized.”

The acceptance from both residents and fellow RAs made the transition smoother.

“I was surrounded by the right people to make the first step in saying this is who I am,” Malone says. “People that are aware and educated create a totally different environment.”

Malone also found support in a UVM policy, implemented in 2009, that lets students change their preferred name and pronoun.

While Malone supports the initiative, sometimes it falls short.

“The option is there, but it’s not always recognized by professors,” Malone says. “I’ve had classes where the professor refers to me as ‘she’ multiple times. I know he’s not trying to embarrass me, but there’s a lack of mutual understanding.”

The center offers trainings for university community members, to familiarize them with LGBT identities and UVM programs offered, according to UVM’s website.

For Malone, UVM’s acceptance of Parker has been the answer to the depression that stemmed from not living honestly.

“Knowing that even if outside UVM I can’t exist as Parker, I still have this one world that I’m happy and myself in,” Malone says. “Nobody can take that away from me while I’m here.”

UVM junior Conor Banfield shares the sentiment.

Banfield, a homosexual male said before UVM he was “miserable,” but now he’s the happiest he’s ever been.

Having “come out” right before college, it was at UVM that he learned to be himself.

“Being out at school, I finally found who I was,” he says. “I wasn’t hiding behind barriers, it was me, and people were getting to actually know me.”

But UVM isn’t perfect. Banfield mentioned times when fellow intramural hockey players teased him, another time when a homophobic roommate banned him from a friend’s room and even a time he was punched after assuming another male student was gay.

But Banfield doesn’t care what people think.

“They want the reaction and if you give it to them you give them what they want,” he says. “I’m not gonna give it to them. You can label me all you want, but it doesn’t make you a better person.”